Spam sticking to Pinterest

Website shuts accounts in move to curb problem

BAD TASTE: Misleading links have become a challenge for users of the popular Pinterest, which is monitoring for spamming activity.

BAD TASTE: Misleading links have become a challenge for users of the popular Pinterest, which is monitoring for spamming activity.

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Four months after announcing a war on spam, the popular online bulletin board Pinterest is still overrun by misleading links and phony accounts that threaten its nascent user base.

This phenomenon should be on the radar of the throngs of businesses and social media strategists that have directed considerable resources at the site, which is seen as an effective — and free — means of non-intrusive advertising.

Pinterest spam has been a headache for Brittany Leaning of HubSpot’s social media marketing team. “Pinterest is not the place it used to be,” she said. “Spammers have caught on to the trend and are now bombarding the feeds with irrelevant descriptions and links connected with popular images.”

For example, Leaning said, when searching for the phrase “exercise,” a user might find 20 versions of the same exercise-themed image. But clicking on the image would bring you to a money-making site that has nothing to do with exercise.

Jason Pinto, chief marketing officer for Wilmington-based Grow Socially, said he tells his clients that the presence of spam is confirmation of Pinterest’s popularity. That said, Pinto’s social media marketing firm has its clients craft a rapid response plan in the event of a spam attack.

“They have to have a plan to reach out to the social media audience,” Pinto said.

But users aren’t necessarily forgiving. After months of blockbuster hits, traffic on Pinterest started to drop mid-July, according to the tracking site Alexa. The site hasn’t been popular long enough to determine if the trend is seasonal or long term.

Tim Erlin, Minneapolis-based director of IT security and risk strategist for NCircle, said Pinterest is particularly vulnerable to being overrun by spammers because of its copious links to other sites, and because its users increasingly face password thefts.

“There’s a great risk for cross-pollination of users’ credentials,” Erlin said. “It’s an interesting challenge.”

For its part, Pinterest stepped up anti-spam efforts in April and initiated a mass shutdown of spam-laced accounts last month.

“We’re constantly monitoring for suspicious activity,” Pinterest said in a statement.

In fact, they may have gone too far. Steph Yiu, who manages the Pinterest page for the Hub-based television show America’s Test Kitchen, has noticed a flurry of posts mistakenly marked as spam. Said Yiu, “We love using Pinterest and understand it’s a startup.”